They Also Tear You Apart
by Rointheta
Summary: <html><head></head>Courtney whirled around at the sound of the Doctor's raspy voice. 'I didn't touch anything! Promise.' He stepped over the threshold and maneuvered around the dirty trainers and a heap of frilly dressing gown and fuzzy slippers. 'How did you find this room' - Courtney Woods accidentally finds Rose's old room. Hints of Ten/Rose.</html>


**thanks to _resile_ for reading it through**  
><strong>written from this prompt: <strong>"Can you write a short ficlet where Courtney woods stumbles across a certain pink room? Her mind immediately goes to 'mr. Pink' but then later discovers it belonged to another female companion in which the doctor hasn't let his mind touch the memory of for a very long time."  
><strong>spoilers<strong>: Set toward the end of _The Caretaker_.**  
><strong>

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><p><strong>THEY ALSO TEAR YOU APART<strong>_  
><em>

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><p>Courtney frowned, surveying the unfamiliar corridor stretching out before her. It didn't look like the one she'd walked down only minutes before when she followed the Doctor's directions to the loo. These walls were rounded and golden with several hexagon-shaped lights running from floor to ceiling.<p>

"Hello? Doctor, are you there? Hello?"

When she didn't get an answer, she started walking, suppressing the tug of fear in the pit of her stomach that told her that if she were to get lost here, deep in the bowels of the ship, she might not find her way out again. Would the Doctor even care?

She swallowed. Of course he would. He wouldn't leave her to rot.

Would he?

She reached a door, a plain-looking one in wood with a regular knob and everything. No sign. The loo door had a sign. The galley too, and the sickbay. She'd seen those two on her way, and both were adorned with holographic signs that flickered to life when she passed.

She shrugged, mouth quirked into a half-smile, and opened the door, only to find herself in a similar corridor, except this one had ten doors, five on each side.

"Hello?" Her voice bounced along the walls. "Anybody here?"

She tried the first two doors. Both led her to generic rooms with single beds, a wardrobe, and a desk with a chair, all in plain colours, as though the rooms were waiting for an occupant to bring them to life with their personal touch. The third door, however, brought her to a cosy, well-furnished, and incredibly messy, bedroom in different hues of pink. It looked as though the person living there had just left in a hurry, wardrobe door open, bed unmade, and muddy trainers on the floor. Must be Miss Oswald's. Who would've known that prim little miss was such a slob? Or so in love with _pink_, for that matter.

"Inspired by the Squaddie, eh?" Courtney mumbled to herself, grinning, and walked inside with her hands behind her back.

"I don't let those on board."

Courtney whirled around at the sound of the Doctor's raspy voice. "I didn't touch anything! Promise."

He stepped over the threshold and maneuvered around the dirty trainers and a heap of frilly dressing gown and fuzzy slippers. "How did you find this room?"

"I didn't."

His eyebrows rose, chin tilting down. "Oh. It found _you_."

"Yeah, yeah, it did, actually. Is it Miss Oswald's?"

He shook his head, trailing his fingers over the different knickknacks placed on a vanity. Most were colourful jars or flat boxes, but to the side stood a gathering of tiny glass bottles, sparkling like jewels in the dim light streaming in from the corridor. He lifted an emerald green bottle and ran it under his nose, drawing in the scent deeply, then put it back with a hum.

"Whose is it, then?"

He shrugged, moving over to one of the nightstands positioned on either side of the bed. "Don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know? Isn't it your ship?"

"I've lived for a long time." He turned on and off the lamp hanging above the nightstand, then hummed again, fingers closing around a striped tie which lay on top of a tome along with a pair of glasses. "Travelled with a lot of people. Bring one on board. They leave. There's a vacancy. I find someone else. This tie," he said, squeezing it and emphasising each word with a curt movement up and down. "This tie…" He brought it to his nose for a big sniff as well, brows even more deeply furrowed. "Ah."

"What?"

"It's mine. This tie. It's mine... Was mine."

"So this is your old room?" She fluttered her eyelashes, simpering. "You really must like pink."

"Of course!" He put the tie back and grinned, thrusting his arms out in a dramatic gesture. "Who doesn't like pink? It's a lovely colour!"

"And that?" She nodded at a yellow cotton bra slung over the lamp above the other nightstand. "That yours too?"

He looked at it, shifted, the smallest movement that brought his arms closer to his sides, shoulders hunching, then drifted his eyes over the bed. It was a rumpled queen-size with a pair of knickers peeking out from under it, and it made her cheeks heat up.

"Sorry," she said, more to the floor than to him.

"For what?"

She looked at him then, found him looking back at her with the same gruff face as he always seemed to wear. "Losing your old girlfriend, wife, whatever she was. Having a vacancy to fill. She must've been special to you."

"Perhaps she was. Perhaps she wasn't. Perhaps," he turned on the nightstand lamp again, illuminating the striped bit of cloth curled up on the tome, "she just borrowed my tie."

"What? You still don't remember? Are you senile or something?"

A smile crept across his face, but it did nothing to brighten his piercing eyes. "Now, Courtney… What was your name?"

"Woods. It's Courtney Woods. Forgetting me already, are you?"

"Maybe I would, Miss Woods," he arched an eyebrow, "had you been special."

She pulled a face at him, but turned around and walked through the door when he motioned her to leave, then gasped when she found herself on top of the stairs running down to the console room.

"Whoa. How did you do that?"

He flicked his coat open and smoothed his hands over the red lining, one corner of his mouth tugged up. "Magic."

She rolled her eyes. "You think you're so impressive."

The last word had barely fallen from her lips before he stiffened, one hand clutching at the railings, the other pressed to his heart. His eyes glazed over, mouth dropped open, and the sight of it made her feel funny in her stomach, tight in her chest. The only time she'd seen anyone looking even close to that, was when her aunt had got news about her son being in a car crash. Courtney could still hear her aunt's wails of grief once the information had sunk in, could still feel her baby cousin in her arms from when she'd hugged him tightly and curled up in the corner of her aunt's living room, holding her hands over the toddler's ears instead of her own.

Courtney backed down the stairs, putting as much distance between her and the Doctor as she could, then bumped into the weird robot thing. The clang ringing out in the room when her heel connected with its metal pulled the Doctor out of his state, and he plastered another disconcerting smile on his face and clapped his hands together, rubbing them.

"Ah. That's right. We're on a mission. I'll show you just how impressive I am. Ever seen space?"

She blinked away the tears brimming in her eyes. "What?"

"_You_ haven't forgotten already, have you?"

He opened the doors, making her scramble back in the opposite direction when the glittering vastness of the universe spread out before them.

"Relax, you won't get sucked out," he said, moving the robot to the doors, then giving it a push.

Courtney inched closer to watch it float out in space, gripping the doorjamb just in case.

"Farewell, Skovox Blixter." The Doctor leant against the doorway, waving. "Have a nice war. So," he turned to her, "Courtney Woods, impressed yet?"

She swallowed the saliva forming in her mouth. "Actually, I'm feeling a bit ill."

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><p><strong><em>the end<em>**


End file.
